


Regrets

by tbsavafob6



Category: Hannibal (TV)
Genre: Alternate Ending, Alternate Universe, Angst, Character Death, Gen, M/M, Sad Ending, What-If
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-06-26
Updated: 2014-06-26
Packaged: 2018-02-06 06:31:47
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,261
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1847950
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/tbsavafob6/pseuds/tbsavafob6
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>He went to tattlecrime.com, knowing the creator was alive. The first article was an uncreative title. Innocent? He sighed. Will saved her, yet she still ruined him. Then he saw the articles picture and description. He read the first paragraph in disbelief. He tossed the devise across the room, breaking it beyond repair.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Regrets

**Author's Note:**

> This was written for the murderhusbandsnetwork challenge for this week. The prompt was Innocent...? Of course, I went towards an angst route, rather than my usual fluff. I hate myself for that. This work is unbeta'd.
> 
> From what I've read and listened to, Will appears to be the only character we know is going to survive. I wrote this as a what if scenario where everyone but Will lived through that night.

Hannibal found the article on Bedalia’s tablet. He had cut himself from all contact in the world for a week before his curiosity got the better of him. He needed to know how Will was recovering. He needed to know if he was awake from their last encounter or not.

 

He went to tattlecrime.com, knowing the creator was alive. The first article was an uncreative title. _Innocent?_ He sighed. Will saved her, yet she still ruined him. Then he saw the articles picture and description. He read the first paragraph in disbelief. He tossed the devise across the room, breaking it beyond repair.

 

Bedalia would come back to their room to find a broken tablet and a note wishing her well.

~~

Hannibal never saw himself as a coward. And in every sense, he wasn’t. Yet he had abandoned Bedalia in France as he travelled everywhere. He never read the entire article. Just enough to know. A year would pass. Then two. Then five, before he would get up the courage to return to the States.

 

He went to Alana first, frightening her the way Will had so long ago. There was a difference now. Alana, wheelchair bound and with glasses perched on her elegant nose, looked at his like a monster. He supposed he was.

 

“Where is he?” She looked on, frozen. She flinched when he touched her hand. There was a time when that wouldn’t have happened.

 

“Hannibal, he’s…” She found her voice, but spoke quietly, as if a high volume would reward her with death. “Louisiana, next to his father.”

 

“Thank you.” He disappeared with haste, knowing she would call Jack or the cops soon. He wondered if he would be caught.

~~

Hannibal found Will with ease. He had told him where his father was years before. He placed a flower on Will’s grave. “Myrtle. A flower that can be very hard to find in the United States.” He placed it easily on Will’s grave. “I doubt you would appreciate its meaning.” He sat down, leaning against the gray stone that was a poor reflection of Will. He had been luminous. Hannibal had taken advantage of that. “I should have left when you called.”

 

_“They know.”_ His mind supplied. How familiar they were. Those words were what brought him to this moment.

 

“Were you a close friend?” Hannibal looked up to see an older woman. She had a familiarity to her. She looked at the fresh flower. “Oh. More than that I see.”

 

He stood from his spot, looking at her. She didn’t keep eye contact. “You know this flower.”

 

“Yes. Very well. I gave a bit to his father long ago.” Her hand shook as she touched the stone. “William wasn’t even a thought.”

 

It clicked then. “He looked like you.”

 

She smiled, but there was no happiness. “When I left, I thought his father would leave him too. He was a better man than I gave him credit for. Better person than I was.” Her hand slid from the top of gravestone. “Were you at the funeral?”

 

Hannibal shook his head. “I was, away.”

 

“As was I.” She paused. “I was so scared that he would be like me, and it happened anyways. Only it was so much worse. That woman tracked me down, asking about what it was like to be the long lost mother of the partner of the Chesapeake Ripper.” She looked down at the empty spot next to Will’s grave. “I’m going to have asphodel planted here.”

 

“Interesting choice.”

 

She nodded. “I carry so many regrets when it comes to William. If only I had said hi. Just once.” She turned, getting ready to leave. “Goodbye, ah, I never got your name.”

 

“Dr. Anthony Fell.”

 

“Helen Michaels.”

 

“Goodbye.” She smiled, leaving him alone. His hand rested on the cold stone. “I carry my regrets as well.”

~~

The body of Dr. Alec Smith was found mutilated and placed on display. One organ was missing, the heart. The rest was spread out like a mural around the body. This was the man that botched Will’s surgery. Hannibal read the file. One rookie mistake and Will bled out on the operating table.

 

He would’ve lived if Hannibal had been the one to perform the surgery.

 

The man had been suspended, but he didn’t lose his license. Hannibal gave him an early retirement as a gift. He ate it on the anniversary of Will’s death in his honour.

~~

His last visit was to Jack. Abigail, she was hidden away. Punished for the crimes of her fathers. She had lived and Will had not. What a cruel irony.

 

“Hannibal.” Jack whispered before he had made his presence known. He was petting an old but familiar dog. “He’s the last one. Winston is still waiting for him.”

 

“He wasn’t supposed to die. You, Abigail, even Alana, but not him.”

 

“Your punishment backfired.” Jack said with ease. “I wasn’t sure you even missed him.”

 

“This is me letting him go.”

 

“Five years is a long time to mourn. Especially for something that doesn’t feel.” Jack took a sip from his glass. Most likely bourbon. Hannibal remembered him being fond of that. “Of course, he did change you. Brought out the human that I was certain wasn’t there.”

 

“I found out through an article, yet I never finished reading it.”

 

“You should finish it Hannibal, just so you know how much you took away from him.”

 

Hannibal would leave after that comment. He was certain Jack would kill him if he stayed any longer. He wasn’t ready for that sort of match. Not today.

~~

He wandered into Wolftrap. This would be his last stop before, well, anywhere. Everywhere. It had gone into disrepair, nature taking its toll on the weatherworn house. Hannibal sat on the porch and closed his eyes.

 

“Hannibal. Visiting me after so long.” He looked up. This was his view of Will. He looked like the night he brought him Randal Tier. “Now you can’t get me out of your head.”

 

“You were always in the forefront of my thoughts.”

 

“You think you can control everything. Too bad you’re not the God you think yourself to be.”

 

“Will we meet again?”

 

“Depends on what you mean. In your mind, anytime you please. Physically, depends on rather there’s a heaven, or hell. Maybe reincarnation. You do love the idea of rebirth. Perhaps we will meet in another lifetime where you don’t kill me.”

 

“Did you love me?”

 

“That’s for you to determine, but think about that night. Think back to the way we saw each other, even as you left me bleeding out. I’m only what you built Hannibal, not what you want.”

 

Hannibal opened his eyes. Night had fallen around him. How devastating the darkness looked here now.

 

He left Virginia with a printed copy of the article. Most of it was typical Freddie Lounds style, but one paragraph made him pause.

 

> _Possibly one of the most devastating mistakes made by the FBI in years was allowing Will Graham to work undercover alone, only to remove backup when needed most. Rather Will was innocent of his transgressions or not, this allowed Dr. Hannibal Lecter to walk away a free man while the one who could catch him passed away on the operating table. Will we ever find Hannibal the Cannibal now? Unlikely. We will be reminded of this misgiving of the Federal Bureau of Investigations ever year on the anniversary of the escape of the Chesapeake Ripper._

 

He would burn the article not long after he landed.

**Author's Note:**

> Yes. That's how I ended it. The title is a bit uncreative, but I didn't know what to call this work.
> 
> (A part of me almost made a happy ending, but that didn't work out. It felt, cheap.)


End file.
